


Both Dances

by WeBuiltThePyramids



Category: The Mentalist
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-08
Updated: 2015-02-08
Packaged: 2018-03-11 00:55:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3309695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WeBuiltThePyramids/pseuds/WeBuiltThePyramids
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Well just keep what I said in mind," she said with a smile. "In case someone ever comes along where...where doing both dances doesn't seem so difficult." Set shortly before Copper Bullet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Both Dances

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ennaxor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ennaxor/gifts).



> Takes place shortly before Copper Bullet

"Well hey, that trip wasn't for nothing," Vega said. "We now know four places where Riley didn't hide the harddrive."

"Ah, Agent Vega, always with the glass half full," Wylie joked.

"Not always," Vega said, looking out the front window. "Wylie, pull over."

"What? Why?"

"Look." She pointed out the window. "Something's wrong with the car, see that?"

"See what?"

"The engine is smoking."

Wylie guided the car off the road "The smoke would be thicker than that, wouldn't it?"

"This isn't a movie, Wylie. This is what a problem that isn't enhanced by special effects looks like. The engine must have overheated." Vega unbuckled and pulled down her sunglasses. "What do you know about engines?"

"Well, my uncle did own a repair shop," Wylie said jumping out of the car and walking around to the front of the car. He reached down and popped the hood, both he and Vega jumping backward as they were hit with a wave of heat. "Yep," Wylie said, fanning the air around his face and staring at the car. "Exactly as I suspected."

"You know what's wrong?" Vega asked.

Wylie turned to look at her. "The engine must have overheated."

Vega stared at him for several seconds, then gave a playful grin and swatted him. "You're such a big help."

"It's what I do," Wylie said, smiling and putting his hands on his hips. He grinned when she rolled her eyes – an action he could only see since he was tall enough to look down her sunglasses.

"In all seriousness, you got a signal?" Vega asked.

"Not out here," Wylie said. "But someone's bound to come down the road at some point."

"Is 'at some point' before or after the local wildlife can treat themselves to Dehydrated FBI Agents?"

"Look!" Wylie said, grinning triumphantly and pointing up the road where a dark colored car was approaching. "Right there. Hey! Hey!" He jumped up and down, waving his arms.

Vega looked at him with amusement. "Wylie, there is no way they don't see us."

"I am doing everything I can to get us rescued," Wylie said. "It alarms me that you do not seem to be as invested in that."

"Oh brother," Vega said, rolling her eyes again.

The car slowed down, the passenger window glided down, and a red headed woman stuck her head out. "You folks okay?"

"Our engine overheated," Wylie said. "Do you have any coolant on you? Or a cell phone with a signal."

The driver exited the vehicle. "We might have something in the trunk..." he said, "at the very least, we can probably get ahold of someone. We're only ten miles from a town and there should be enough of a signal there, even though it appears to be very small."

"We really apprec..." Vega trailed off upon glancing at Wylie. "Wylie?"

"Oh my gosh," Wylie said, grinning. "Agent Rigsby!"

Rigsby turned to look at him. "Agent Wylie?"

"What are you guys doing here?" Wylie asked. "You don't live around here!" he looked back at the passenger side and gave a little wave. "Hi, Agent Van Pelt!"

"We're taking the kids on a little road trip," Grace said, slipping out of the car. "Thought we'd swing by Austin and visit our old team."

"It's great to see you guys!" Wylie said. "How are the kids? Maddie and Ben, right?"

"Ahem."

"Oh. Oh! Sorry." Wylie gestured toward the couple. "This is Agent Rigsby and Agent Van Pelt. They worked under Lisbon when she was in Sacramento with Jane and Cho. Then Abbott shut down their organization because basically everyone there was a criminal except for them."

Vega raised her eyebrows. "Ah."

"Agents," Wylie said. "Are you still agents? Well anyway, this is Michelle Vega. She's our rookie agent. Her favorite pastimes include video games, tackling bad guys and giving me a hard time."

"Is that so?" Grace said with a smirk.

"It is so," Vega said, crossing her arms. "Well I suppose as you have met Agent Wylie, it wouldn't surprise you to find out that his pastimes include computers, losing to me at video games, and attempting to match wits with me."

"Neither of us are good with cars. Though." Wylie stammered, lowering his voice.

"I think our best bet here is to push the car further off the road and then give you guys a lift into town," Rigsby said. "They're bound to have someone who can come out and tow it in, and you'll be out of this heat sooner."

"We only have room for one," Grace said. "I'll stay behind with the car."

"Just hold Ben in your lap," Rigsby said.

"That's dangerous."

"We are the only functioning car on this entire road and the speed limit is twenty miles an hour," Rigsby said. "He'll be fine."

She shrugged. "Alright." She leaned into the car via her rolled down window. "Benny, can you come here, please?"

The rear driver's side door opened and a small boy hopped out and moved toward the back of the car. Simultaneously with the sound of the door slamming shut, he disappeared from view.

Rigsby glanced around the car. "Got your dragon stuck in the door there, Ben."

The boy's head appeared through the windows again, and the door opened, then shut. He ran around the back of the car, a stuffed dragon dragging behind him. "What?" he asked Grace, looking up at her.

"Do you want to ride in the front seat with me?"

"You said I couldn't until I was a hundred pounds."

"I'm going to be with you. Do you think you and I together are more than a hundred pounds?"

"We're at least half a hundred."

"We're heavy enough," Grace said, smiling and reaching down to pick him up.

"We can't thank you guys enough," Vega said when Rigsby motioned for them to get into the car. "I'll take the middle," she told Wylie. I'm smaller."

"It's no problem," Grace said, shifting her weight to center Ben on her lap.

"Aw, who is this?" Vega asked, squeezing into the middle seat and leaning over to look in the car seat that was behind Grace.

"That's little Maddie," Rigsby said. "Ben is my son from a previous relationship, Maddie is mine and Grace's daughter."

"She's so adorable!" Vega said, peering down at the baby. "Hi!"

"Babies always find me funny," Wylie said.

"Well then I can assume you didn't trot out your lame engine joke with any of them," Vega said, Wylie elbowed her playfully, and she giggled.

Wayne looked at them through the review mirror. "So how long have you been with the FBI, Vega?"

"Just a couple of months," she said. "Working for Abbott's team is my first assignment."

"You like it so far?" Grace said.

"It's a lot of fun," she said. "I wasn't too sure about Patrick Jane at first..."

"He's a bit of a learning curve," Rigsby said with a chuckle.

"His methods are so innovative though," Vega said. "I mean, just the other week, Wylie and I..."

* * *

By the time Vega managed to finish the story despite Wylie's interruptions to add detail, the car had reached the small town Rigsby had noted on his GPS before his phone lost the signal. "That certainly sounds like Jane," Grace said, laughing as she eased Ben off her lap and exited the car, reaching in the back to remove her daughter from the car seat.

"It's pretty cool," Wylie said. "I mean, I was all for his way of doing things right away. This one had to warm up to him a bit..."

"I prefer to assess a situation before jumping into it," Vega said. "Which is probably why I always beat you when we play video games."

"Hey, I prefer to go big or go home."

"What you've been doing on the game has been more like go big and go home." She giggled when Wylie failed to come up with a response. "There's the failure at matching wits that I mentioned earlier," she said to Grace.

"I see," she said.

"I'm going to go use the restroom over there," Vega said. "Can you see if you can get ahold of Cho?"

"Already texted him," Wylie said.

"Great. Be right back!"

"Hey, Wylie," Rigsby said in a stage whisper once she was gone. "You know what girls really dig?"

"...what?" Wylie asked, confused.

"Oh brother," Grace said, rolling her eyes.

Rigsby seemed frustrated that Wylie did not understand what he was talking about. "You know, tips. I'm giving you tips on how to get Agent Vega."

"Oh. Well. Um...I..." Wylie shrugged. "She. Um. She just...wants to focus on work, you know. She's driven, she wants to be taken seriously. You know how rough it is for women to move up in jobs like this. There are some awfully sexist men out there. Not...not that Abbott is like that, but she's very determined."

Grace was frowning. "I'll be back," she said, passing Maddie to her husband.

Vega turned off the water and dried her hands, frowning at her now slightly unkempt ponytail. She set her sunglasses on the counter, then reached up and slid the band out of her hair, shaking her head and watching her hair settle around her shoulders.

"Hey." Grace's voice just preceded her into the bathroom.

"Hi," Vega said, drawing her hair back behind her head. It was too hot to wear down. "Am I holding you guys up?"

"Not at all. So you're liking the FBI?"

"Oh, so much," Vega said. "I'm enjoying even more than I thought I would...though Cho is a hard man to impress."

Grace laughed. "Yes he is, but he's a good guy. He had our backs more times than I could count."

"Lisbon has told me some stories of his heroics," Vega said. "I hope I can make him proud of me one day. He's such a model agent. I can't help but look up to him, you know?"

"I understand," Grace said. "I was really lucky to be on a team like we had under Lisbon. You know when she found out that Wayne and I were dating, she kept our secret from us until the new department head put our backs all up against the wall?"

"Really," Vega said, raising her eyebrows. "I can't imagine trying to hide a workplace romance. There's no time for that sort of thing, you know?"

Grace shrugged. "You can make time, if it means enough to you."

Vega shook her head. "A guy asked me out – a guy we worked with on a case – but any energy I would put into a relationship is just energy I'm not putting into the job. And if I want to be successful...maybe lead a team of my own someday...then I can't split my efforts."

"Who told you that?" Grace asked. "Abbot is married, and look at how successful he is. Wayne and I are parents, and we both work full time. Jane...well, he might not be the best example, but my point is, don't shut yourself in and not explore opportunities just because they aren't related to work. I remember when I was your age. It's tough. And Lisbon, though I love her to death, she wouldn't let us really talk about our personal lives, so I didn't get any personal mentoring from her until I'd been there for a while. I wish I'd had someone to tell me that all of us, men and women, can have relationships and families and still be great at what we do."

Vega stood still, looking at Grace for several seconds, then shrugged. "Well, I mean, I wasn't exactly interested in that guy anyway."

"Well just keep what I said in mind," Grace said with a smile. "In case someone ever comes along where you are. Where doing both dances doesn't seem so difficult"

Vega smiled. "Thanks. I can see why Jane, Lisbon, and Cho speak so highly of you guys."

"Come on," Grace said, "I think Wylie got ahold of Cho."

The two women walked back out into the sun, and once the sunglasses went back on, Vega could see Wylie waving them over with the hand that held his phone. "Looks like you're right."

"What's the news?" Grace asked as they approached.

"Cho will be here in less than an hour," Wylie said. "He'll drive us back to Austin." He grinned at Vega. "See? Once again, doing everything in my power to get us out of this situation." Vega laughed. "Stop rolling your eyes at my acts of heroism," he said, putting his hands on his hips.

"How in the world can you tell if I'm rolling my eyes?" Vega said.

Wylie gave her a mischievous smile. "I can see down your sunglasses."

Vega pretended to be horrified, covering her eyes with her hands, both she and Wylie laughing. Rigsby's eyes locked on his wife's and they smiled knowingly. One didn't have to have worked with Patrick Jane to see what was going on in front of them.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you guys liked it! It was admittedly very difficult to write Rigs and Pelty after so long without seeing them, and I'm still getting used to writing Wylie and Vega, but hopefully it was enjoyable! I tried to include some headcanons of mine in here too - that Lisbon and Vega do actually speak to each other on a regular basis, that they've told their new team about Rigsby and Van Pelt, and that when computer stuff is involved, Abbott does send Wylie and Vega out on low danger jobs together (like when they searched for the clothes.)


End file.
